Method for selectively verifying or blocking remote purchase requests

ABSTRACT

A method for partially verifying the legitimacy of a remote purchase request based on a card number from a card issuing financial institution. The method includes receiving and storing a first purchase request information set including an origin and a card number. Further, the origin and the card number are sent to the card issuing financial institution to determine if the origin matches an origin on file for the card number at the card issuing financial institution.

RELATED APPLICATIONS

This application is a continuation of U.S. patent application Ser. No.11/563,577, filed Nov. 27, 2006 now U.S. Pat. No. 7,657,460, which is acontinuation of U.S. patent application Ser. No. 10/782,023, filed Feb.18, 2004 now U.S. Pat. No. 7,158,947, each of which is incorporatedherein by reference and to which priority is claimed. This applicationfurther relates to U.S. Pat. No. 6,108,642, which is also incorporatedherein by reference.

BACKGROUND OF THE INVENTION

Merchants who sell goods on credit over the telephone or the Internet(“remote sale merchants”) encounter the difficult problem of credit cardfraud. Unlike a merchant selling goods on credit in the physicalpresence of the purchasers, a remote sale merchant does not have anopportunity to inspect the signature of the purchaser or to compare aphoto ID card with the purchaser's actual appearance.

Typically, a remote sale merchant employs a computer system havingterminals or “voice response units,” each of which is connected with atelephone line, and is controlled by an operator wearing the commonlyfamiliar telephone headset and receiving telephone calls Each operatortypically answers the telephone and receives purchase requestinformation from the caller that includes the merchandise that thecaller wishes to purchase, the person and address to which themerchandise should be delivered, the name of the person making thepurchase and a credit or debit card number to which the purchase shouldbe charged. (As used in this application the term “card number” refersto any charge authorizing number including debit card numbers, creditcard numbers, or a charge authorizing number that is not shown on anycard.) The operator enters this information into the terminal andpresses a keyboard button which causes the computer system to send anauthorization query to the card issuing financial institution. Thedecision to authorize is typically based on whether the number islegitimate, adequate funds are available in the account, and the cardholder is current on his or her payments. If the card issuing financialinstitution declines the charge, the caller is told that the purchasecannot be made. If the financial institution accepts, a charge to thecard number account is initiated and the purchase and shipping addressinformation is automatically forwarded to the shipping department whichfills the order. Optionally, the financial institution may offer anaddress verification service (AVS). To utilize this service the remotepurchase merchant transmits the shipping address or zip code to thefinancial institution, which responds with a flag indicating whether ornot the address and/or zip code matches the billing address on file.

Another computer system for effecting remote purchases is a computersystem for enabling parties to purchase items over the internet or froma computer connected by modem to the computer system. In such a computersystem, the party making a purchase request enters his or her creditcard number and a descriptor or descriptors of the merchandise to bepurchased into a remote terminal that is connected by way of theinternet or a telephone line to the computer system. Again, the computersystem generates an authorization query to the card issuing financialinstitution and contacts the shipping department to fill the order ifthe purchase is authorized.

Unfortunately, there is sometimes a considerable time interval betweenthe time a credit card is stolen and the time when the theft of the cardis reported to the card issuing financial institution. Moreover, the'notation and illicit use of a credit card number by a dishonest storeclerk or other person able to observe the number is likely to becompletely undetected until the number is used fraudulently and the cardholder receives his or her statement.

When a cardholder does receive a statement bearing fraudulent charges,he or she is likely to quickly disavow the purchases. In these cases thecard issuing financial institution typically will ask the merchant tocorroborate the purchase with a copy of a signed credit card receipt.For the case of a remote purchase, the merchant will not be able toproduce a signed receipt. In this situation the merchant is forced toaccept a “charge back” and to return the funds to the card issuinginstitution.

Credit card fraud varies from casual fraud by the occasionally dishonestand adventurous to sophisticated operations that attempt to purchase alarge quantity of a particular item and to profitably reintroduce itinto the stream of commerce. As systems for selling items over theInternet and telephone lines become increasingly automatic, fraudsystems also become more automatic. For example, it has been known forthieves to use a computer to invent credit card numbers and submit alarge number of purchase requests, knowing that a portion of theinvented card numbers will be for issued credit cards and hoping thatsome of the purchase requests will be accepted.

Despite the occurrence of fraud, the convenience and speed of usingcredit cards to make remote purchases is causing a continued expansionin catalog sales, advertised telephone sales and sales over theInternet.

SUMMARY OF THE INVENTION

In a first separate aspect, the present invention is a method forpartially verifying the legitimacy of a remote purchase request based ona card number from a card issuing financial institution. The methodincludes receiving and storing a first purchase request information setincluding an origin and a card number. Further, the origin and the cardnumber are sent to the card issuing financial institution to determineif the origin matches an origin on file for the card number at the cardissuing financial institution.

In a second separate aspect, the present invention is a computer systemfor processing and selectively blocking a current remote purchaserequest. The computer system comprises a data input subsystem, connectedto a, data line, capable of receiving a purchase request informationset, including a purchase request origin. In addition, a memorysubsystem is adapted to store the purchase request information set and anegative file of origin. Finally, a logic subsystem is adapted toautomatically compare the purchase request origin with the negative fileof origins and to automatically block the purchase request if thepurchase request origin matches any origin in the negative file oforigins.

The foregoing and other objectives, features, and advantages of theinvention will be more readily understood upon consideration of thefollowing detailed description of the invention, taken in conjunctionwith the accompanying drawings.

BRIEF DESCRIPTION OF THE SEVERAL VIEWS OF THE DRAWINGS

FIG. 1 is a block diagram of a remote purchase processing computersystem according to the present invention.

FIG. 2A is a flow chart of the beginning part of the logic processimplemented in the system of FIG. 1.

FIG. 2B is a flow chart of the end part of the logic process implementedin the system of FIG. 1.

DETAILED DESCRIPTION OF THE PREFERRED EMBODIMENTS

A preferred embodiment of the present invention comprises a remotepurchase processing computer system 10 that is connected to a data line12, over which it receives a remote purchase request initiating signal(block 110 in FIG. 2 a): In one preferred embodiment, data line 12 is atelephone line. In this instance, the purchase request initiating signal(block 110) would be a ring signal received over the telephone line. Adata input subsystem 14 answers the ring signal, in a manner familiar tothose skilled in the art of telephony, and automatically receives acaller ID signal describing the telephone number of the calling station(block 112). In many systems 10, data input subsystem 14 includes ahuman operator or operators who query the callers, hear the purchaserequest information (block 112) and translate the auditory purchaserequest information into a set of keystrokes (block 114) that are inputinto system 10 via a terminal keyboard. It is becoming increasinglycommon, however, to avoid the necessity of employing a human operator byallowing the caller to enter all of the information by way of atelephone keypad. A dual tone modulated frequency translation system isused to translate information (block 114) that the purchase requestorinputs into the telephone keypad. For those who are calling by way oftheir own computer/modem system, data input system 14 would include amodem for collecting all of the purchase information set.

Alternatively, data line 12 could be a direct connection to the internetor some other computer network. In this embodiment, computer system 10receives the internet address of the purchase request information overdata line 12 and subsystem 14 does not employ a human operator.

In any one of the embodiments, each assembled purchase requestinformation set is sent (block 115) to a logic subsystem 20. Logicsubsystem 20 compares the purchase request information set toinformation stored in a memory subsystem 22. The bulk of the informationin memory subsystem 22 typically will have been gathered from previouspurchase requests. Even if there are many terminals in data inputsubsystem 14 all of the information sets are cataloged together inmemory subsystem 22 so that a more effective data bank is constructed.Information in memory subsystem 22, however, may also have been gatheredfrom other sources. For example, a merchant may decide to not authorizepurchase requests from telephone calls originating from jails andprisons. Therefore; all of the telephone numbers for telephones in jailsand prisons are kept in “a “negative file” of origins that will resultin automatic rejection when detected (decision box 116 of FIG. 2A).Optionally, when the remote merchant determines that an origin hasgenerated a fraudulent purchase, the fraudulent purchase generatingorigin is also entered into the negative file (typically this is donemanually by a keyboard operator).

In one preferred embodiment, “history factors” are computed for bothcard numbers and origins so that the algorithm can take into account thelegitimate purchase history of both the purchase request origin and cardnumber. A purchase request from an origin or card number that has beenused to make legitimate purchases from the merchant in the past is lesslikely to be fraudulent then a call from a Origin or card numberencountered for the first time. Although it is possible that a thief whohas just acquired a stolen card number will make a remote purchaserequest to a merchant that the legitimate card holder purchased from inthe past, it is more likely that the thief will have different tastesand seek to purchase from different merchants to whom the stolen cardnumber and the thief's origin will be new.

Equations 1, 2, 3, and 4 given below show the calculation of thesefactors.

For residences:

$\begin{matrix}{{O\; H\; F} = {1 + {0.001 \times {\sum\limits^{P}\left( {D \times {\min\left\lbrack {N,10} \right\rbrack}} \right)}}}} & (1)\end{matrix}$where OHF=origin history factor,

D=dollar purchase amount,

N=number of months since date of purchase (N≧1), and

P=all same-origin no-fraud-indication purchases more than 1 month old.Public and semi-public telephone, OHF=0.2   (2)

$\begin{matrix}{{C\; N\; H\; F} = {1 + {0.001 \times {\sum\limits^{C}\left( {D \times {\min\left\lbrack {N,10} \right\rbrack}} \right)}}}} & (3)\end{matrix}$where CNHF=card number history factor,

D=dollar purchase amount,

N=number of months since date of purchase, and

C=all the same-card number no-fraud-indication purchases more than 1month old.PRHF=Max(CNHF, OHF)   (4)where PRHF=purchase request history factor.

The history factors are used to determine the amount of purchases whichare allowed over a particular time period as shown in decision boxes118, 120 and 122 in FIG. 2B. The longer a purchase isoutstanding-without being detected as fraudulent, the greater theprobability that the purchase was, indeed, legitimate. For the first onemonth period, of course, little confidence can be had in the purchase,because there is no guarantee that the card holder has been billed forthe purchase. Therefore, purchases less than one month old are notcounted. After that the purchases are given greater weight as they age,until at ten months, when there is little chance of undetected fraud yetbeing detected, they reach their maximum weight.

Purchase requests from public and semi-public telephone numbers such asnumbers originating from motels and pay telephones are given an originhistory factor of 0.2, because no meaningful history can be compiled(equation 2). Also, a person wishing to commit remote purchase fraud islikely to use a telephone which cannot be traced to his or her homeaddress, where he or she is more likely to be identified. Therefore,telephone calls originating from public or semi-public telephones aremore likely to originate fraudulent calls.

Next, an inquiry is made into whether or not an item in the samemerchant defined merchandise category has been purchased within theprevious merchant set time period divided by the purchase requesthistory factor (decision box 118). Sophisticated remote purchase thievesmay try to steal a sizable quantity of particular product because it iseasier to illicitly reintroduce a set of uniform items back into thestream of commerce than to do the same for an eclectic mix. For example,a ring of thieves may attempt to steal 1,000 handbags of a particularpopular make. By having a safeguard such as that in block 118 themerchant limits its exposure to repetitive theft from the samemerchandise category.

Decision boxes 120 and 122 place limits on the monetary value of a day'spurchase and a week's purchase from the same origin. This enables amerchant to limit its exposure to fraud. In particular, this addressesthe case in which a thief has compiled a quantity of credit card numbersand is calling from the same origin, but using a different card numbereach time to avoid any limits placed on each card number. If a merchantprefers, time periods other than a day or a week may be chosen.

If the test results of decision boxes 118, 120 or 122 are positive, thenthe purchase is automatically blocked (block 124) and the case of anoperator controlled terminal, the key which causes a query to be sent toa financial institution is disabled. Together, boxes 118, 120 and 122comprise a set of criteria, any criterion of which could cause thepurchase request to be blocked, if satisfied in the negative. The term“set of criteria,” as used in this application, may include as few asone criterion only.

If the purchase is tentatively authorized in decision box 122, theorigin, card number and purchase amount, and other data as required aresent to the card issuing financial institution for verification (block126). If the financial institution has no origin verification service,then the sending of the origin may be omitted. The financial institutionthat does have an origin verification service will send back a signalindicating whether or not the origin matches any origin that it has onfile for that card number. If any of the tests of boxes 118, 120 or 122were “near misses,” for example if the time since the last purchase ofthe same category of merchandise (box 118) was not much greater than the(user set time period)/(purchase request history factor), then a bitwould be set that would cause the purchase request to be denied if theorigin verification was returned in the negative. The user may bequeried to supply his home telephone number, so that the origin sent tothe card issuing financial institution for verification will more likelybe the one on file.

The terms and expressions which have been employed in the foregoingspecification are used therein as terms of description and not oflimitation, and there is no intention, in the use of such terms andexpressions, of excluding equivalents of the features shown anddescribed or portions thereof, it being recognized that the scope of theinvention is defined and limited only by the claims which follow.

1. A computer system configured to selectively block a remote purchasein which a purchaser attempts to use a card number to purchase one ormore of an item from a vendor's system, the computer system comprising:one or more processors configured to execute one or more computersubsystems, the one or more computer subsystems comprising: a data inputsubsystem configured to receive information included in a first purchaserequest information set that corresponds to a first purchase request tothe vendor's computer system, wherein the first purchase informationrequest set includes (i) an origin of the first purchase request, theorigin representing either a telephone number or internet address, (ii)a card number for the first purchase request, (iii) a requested itemidentification for an item requested in the first purchase request, therequested item identification being associated with a first merchandisecategory, and (iv) a number of requested items in the first purchaserequest for the requested item identification; a memory subsystemconfigured to manage storage of the received information from the firstpurchase request information set, wherein the memory subsystem isfurther configured to manage storage of previously received purchaserequest information sets corresponding to a plurality of previouspurchase requests, the stored previously received purchase requestinformation sets including a second purchase request information setcorresponding to a such purchase request received previously by thevendor's computer system from the same origin as the first purchaserequest, and wherein a requested item identification from the secondpurchase request information set is also associated with the firstmerchandise category; a logic subsystem configured to automaticallydetermine whether a number of items associated with the firstmerchandise category that are requested in purchase request informationsets corresponding to the origin of the first purchase request exceeds apreset threshold number of items associated with the first merchandisecategory, wherein the number of items associated with the firstmerchandise category that are requested in purchase requestscorresponding to the origin of the first purchase request comprises atleast the number of items associated with the first merchandise categoryrequested in the first purchase request and the number of itemsassociated with the first merchandise category requested in the secondpurchase request, and wherein the logic subsystem is further configuredto transmit instructions to the vendor's computer system to block thepurchase associated with the first purchase request responsive to adetermination that the number of items associated with the firstmerchandise category that are requested in purchase request informationrequests corresponding to the origin of the first purchase requestexceeds the preset threshold number of such items.
 2. The computersystem of claim 1, wherein the logic subsystem is further configured todetermine whether the number of items associated with the firstmerchandise category within a set time period exceeds a preset thresholdnumber of such items for the set time period when the logic subsystemdetermines whether the number of items associated with the firstmerchandise category that are requested in purchase request informationsets corresponding to the origin of the first purchase request exceedsthe preset threshold number.
 3. The computer system of claim 1, whereinthe number of items in the first merchandise category includes thenumber of requested items in the first purchase request for therequested item identification.
 4. The computer system of claim 1,wherein the logic subsystem is configured to determine whether thenumber of items in purchase request information sets corresponding tothe origin in the first merchandise category exceeds the presetthreshold number prior to delivery of the remote purchase request to acard issuer by the vendor; and wherein the logic subsystem is configuredto automatically transmit instructions to block the purchase associatedwith the first remote purchase request that results in blocking of thefirst purchase request from being delivered to the card issuer.
 5. Thecomputer system of claim 1, wherein the logic subsystem is furtherconfigured to transmit instructions to the vendor's computer system toblock the purchase associated with the first purchase request responsiveto a determination that the origin of the first purchase request hasgenerated a fraudulent purchase in the past.
 6. A computer systemconfigured to partially verify the legitimacy of a remote purchaserequest to a vendor's computer system based on a card number from a cardissuing institution and an origin from which said remote purchaserequest is made, the system comprising: one or more processorsconfigured to execute one or more computer subsystems, the one or morecomputer subsystems comprising: a data input subsystem configured toreceive information included in a first purchase request information setthat corresponds to a first purchase request to the vendor's computersystem, wherein the first purchase request information set includes anorigin of the first purchase request and a card number for the firstpurchase request; a memory subsystem configured to manage storage of thefirst purchase request information set, wherein the memory subsystem isfurther configured to manage storage of the one or more past purchaserequest information sets associated with a history of purchases madefrom the origin, wherein such one or more past purchase requestinformation sets include at least a second purchase request informationset that corresponds to a second purchase request previously generatedfrom the origin, wherein the memory subsystem is further configured tomanage storage of one or more past purchase request information setsassociated with a history of purchases made with the card number, andwherein such one or more past purchase request information sets includeat least a third purchase request information set that corresponds to apreviously received third purchase request using the card number; and alogic subsystem configured to automatically determine (i) an originhistory factor related to the legitimacy of purchase requests from theorigin, wherein the origin history factor is determined based oninformation from at least the second purchase request information setand a time period between the second purchase request and the firstpurchase request, and (ii) a card number history factor related to thelegitimacy of purchase requests using the card number, wherein the cardnumber history factor is determined based on information from at leastthe third purchase request information set and a time period between thethird purchase request and the first purchase request, wherein the logicsubsystem is further configured to determine whether the first purchaserequest should be verified based on the origin history factor and thecard number history factor, and, responsive to a determination based onthe origin history factor and the card number history factor that thefirst purchase request should be verified, to generate and transmit anindication that the first purchase request is partially verifiedtogether with data related to said first purchase request to the cardissuing institution.
 7. The computer system of claim 6, wherein the timeperiod between the third purchase request and the first purchase requestis at least one month.
 8. The computer system of claim 6, wherein thetime period between the second purchase request and the first purchaserequest is at least one month.
 9. The computer system of claim 6,wherein the logic subsystem is further configured i) to determine apreset threshold based at least on the origin history factor and thecard number history factor, ii) to determine a total monetary value ofthe first purchase request and previous purchase requests from the sameorigin as the first purchase request made within a time periodcorresponding to the preset threshold, and iii) to determine whether thetotal monetary value exceeds the preset threshold.
 10. The computersystem of claim 9, wherein the logic subsystem does not transmit anindication that the first purchase request is partially verifiedtogether with data from said purchase request to the card issuinginstitution when the logic subsystem determines that the total monetaryvalue exceeds the preset threshold.
 11. A computer system configured topartially verify the legitimacy of a remote purchase request to avendor's computer system based on a card number from a card issuinginstitution and an origin from which said remote purchase request ismade, the system comprising: one or more processors configured toexecute one or more computer subsystems, the one or more computersubystems comprising: a data input subsystem configured to receiveinformation included in a first purchase request information set thatcorresponds to a first purchase request to the vendor's computer system,wherein the first purchase request information set includes an origin ofthe first purchase request and a card number for the first purchaserequest; a memory subsystem configured to manage storage of the firstpurchase request information set, wherein the memory subsystem alsomanages storage of previously received information from previous remotepurchase requests, including information from at least one previousremote purchase request from the origin and information from at leastone previous remote purchase request using the card number; a logicsubsystem configured to automatically determine i) a first factorrelated to whether the purchase request is legitimate based on a historyof purchase requests from said origin stored in the electronic memorysubsystem and a time period between the received remote purchase requestand a previous remote purchase request from the origin, and ii) a secondfactor related to whether the remote purchase request is legitimatebased on a history of purchase requests using said card number stored inthe electronic memory subsystem and a time period between the receivedremote purchase request and a previous remote purchase request, whereinthe logic subsystem is further configured to automatically determinewhether the purchase request should be verified based on the firstfactor and the second factor, and responsive to a determination based onthe first factor and the second factor that the received remote purchaserequest should be verified, to generate and transmit an indication thatthe remote purchase request is partially verified together with datafrom said purchase request to the card issuing institution.
 12. Thecomputer system of claim 11, wherein the time period between thereceived remote purchase request and the previous remote purchaserequest is at least one month.
 13. The computer system of claim 11,wherein the logic subsystem is further configured i) to determine apreset threshold based at least on the first factor and the secondfactor, ii) to determine a total monetary value of the first remotepurchase request and previous remote purchase requests made within atime period corresponding to the preset threshold, and iii) to determinewhether the total monetary value exceeds the preset threshold.
 14. Thecomputer system of claim 13, wherein the logic subsystem does nottransmit an indication that the remote purchase request is partiallyverified together with data from said purchase request to the cardissuing institution when the logic subsystem determines that the totalmonetary value exceeds the preset threshold.
 15. A computer-implementedmethod for selectively blocking a remote purchase in which a purchaserattempts to use a card number to purchase one or more of an item from avendor's system, wherein the method is implemented in a purchaseverification computer system configured to detect potentially fraudulenttransactions, comprising: receiving at the purchase verificationcomputer system, a first purchase request information set correspondingto a first purchase request to the vendor's system, wherein the firstpurchase information request set includes (i) an origin of the firstpurchase request, the origin representing either a telephone number orinternet address, (ii) a card number for the first purchase request,(iii) a requested item identification for an item requested in the firstpurchase request, (iv) a number of requested items in the first purchaserequest for the requested item identification, and (v) a timecorresponding to the first purchase request; storing, to an electronicmemory subsystem accessible by the purchase verification computersystem, the first purchase request information set, wherein theelectronic memory subsystem also stores previously received purchaserequest information sets corresponding to a plurality of previouspurchase requests, the stored previously received purchase requestinformation sets including a second purchase request information setcorresponding to a second purchase request previously received by thevendor's system from the same origin of the first purchase request usingthe same card number as the first purchase request for the item havingthe same requested item identification as was included in the firstpurchase request; automatically determining in the purchase verificationcomputer system whether a number of items that are requested in purchaserequest information sets corresponding to the same origin as the firstpurchase request, using the card number of the first purchase request,and requesting the item having the same requested item identification aswas included in the first purchase request exceeds a preset thresholdpurchased using the card number within a time period corresponding tothe preset threshold, wherein the number of items that are requested inpurchase requests using the card number of the first purchase requestcomprises at least the number of items requested in the first purchaserequest and the number of items requested in the second purchaserequest; and automatically transmitting instructions from the purchaseverification computer system to the vendor's system to block thepurchase associated with the first purchase request responsive to adetermination that the number of items that are requested in thepurchase requests corresponding to the same origin as the first purchaserequest, using the same card number of the first purchase request, andrequesting the item having the same requested item identification as wasincluded in the first purchase request exceeds the preset thresholdpurchased using the card number within the time period corresponding tothe preset threshold.
 16. The method of claim 15, further comprising:determining in the purchase verification computer system a totalmonetary value associated with the number of items that are requested inpurchase request information sets using the card number of the firstpurchase request; and determining in the purchase verification computersystem whether the total monetary value that is requested in purchaserequest information sets using the card number of the first purchaserequest exceeds the preset threshold purchased using the card numberwithin the time period corresponding to the preset threshold.